Friday, January 18, 2008

Creating New Build Deployments - Tips

When a new build is available for Revit, you'll probably want to get it installed as quick as possible, but who wants to wait for all the content to be installed? During your client deployment creation select "skip content creation" and create your deployment. Aha...that seemed easy enough but unfortunately, this may result in your new build not finding the various libraries that you intend your users to utilize.

Here is a tip for you: You can predefine all the correct file locations by editing an ini file.

Navigate to your new deployment, find the "Revit Building" folder inside the "Revit Setup" folder within the "Admin Image" folder. There you will find a file named Revit.ini. This file gets copied to your hard drive's program folder when the deployment is run, so make your standard changes to this file prior to pushing your installs.

You can predefine the file locations by adding them to this ini file. Find the strings between [Directories] and [Design Pane] and edit them to point at your company standard folders.

Ex:

[Directories]
AccuRenderRoot=\\BIM\apps\Data\Office Library\RAC
2008\Content\Rendering\AccuRenderRedistDefaultTemplate=\\BIM\apps\Data\Office
Library\RAC 2008\Content\Imperial
Templates\default.rteFamilyTemplatePath=\\BIM\apps\Data\Office Library\RAC
2008\Content\Imperial TemplatesDataLibraryLocations=Imperial
Library=\\BIM\apps\Data\Office Library\RAC 2008\Content\Imperial Library, Metric
Library=\\BIM\apps\Data\Office Library\RAC 2008\Content\Metric Library, Imperial
Detail Library=\\Bim\apps\Data\Office Library\RAC 2008\Content\Imperial
Library\Detail Components, Metric Detail Library=\\BIM\apps\Data\Office
Library\RAC 2008\Content\Metric Library\Detail Components, Training
Files=\\Bim\apps\Data\Office Library\RAC 2008\Content\Training, Haskell
Standards=\\Bim\apps\Data\Office Library\Haskell
StandardsMaterialLibraryLocations=..\Data\MaterialsProjectPath=C:\Revit_LocalImportLineweightsNameDWG=\\BIM\apps\Data\Office
Library\Haskell
Standards\DataFiles\importlineweights-HASKELL.txtExternalParameters=\\BIM\apps\Data\Office
Library\Haskell Standards\Shared Parameters\Issue_Date.txt
[DesignPane]

This will keep all your users accessing a consistent set of standard files.

Note: The installer doesn't appear to overwrite an existing Revit.ini file in that same location, so be sure to uninstall the previous build or rename this file prior to running the new deployment.

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# posted by Richard Binning : Friday, January 18, 2008 0 comments links to this post

Thursday, January 10, 2008

Under the Radar indeed...isn't this SP4?

Don't get me wrong, I'm happy that the "January incident" is fixed, but giving this latest build the identity of SP3 leaves the original SP3 build of 20071109_2345 lost to history. I celebrated that build because of the things it fixed and because it was the first time that I didn't have to wait for the MEP release to be posted. If you saw my blog on November 19th, you'll remember the party that was thrown!

Nevertheless, the "Failed to open document" error is no more with the latest release, so create your deployments and announce them to your users. Now get back to work!

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# posted by Richard Binning : Thursday, January 10, 2008 0 comments links to this post

Wednesday, January 09, 2008

The January Fix for REVIT Products is In...under the radar!

Looks like the fix for problems associated with the Jan 2008 bug are now available. Had problems recently opening older files? Trouble editing schedules or groups?...Install the latest build 20080101_2345 to fix these problems and more! It is definitely time to upgrade and install the latest Revit Builds! Learn about and download the latest builds using the links below.

Click on the Web Update Enhancement List links below to read about the changes and fixes provided in the latest builds.

Want to download the latest English builds directly? Get it/them at Autodesk by clicking on these links:

Don't forget to read up on the content changes. I'll include this important reminder until the next full release.

Thank You Autodesk for understanding the need to release all the disciplines tools at the same time!...

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# posted by Richard Binning : Wednesday, January 09, 2008 0 comments links to this post

Thursday, January 03, 2008

Use VBA to detach unloaded External References (XREFs)

Often when archiving or sending files to consultants, it is desireable to do some house cleaning prior to transmitting them. A common practice in cases like these would be to detach any unnecessary XRefs. And what is more unnecessary than a previously unloaded xref?


Public Sub DetachUnloadedXrefs()
Dim o_Blk As AcadBlock
For Each o_Blk In ThisDrawing.Blocks
If o_Blk.IsXRef And o_Blk.Count = 0 Then
ThisDrawing.Utility.Prompt o_Blk.Name & _
" is an unloaded xref and has been detached." & vbCrLf
o_Blk.Detach
End If
Next
End Sub


Hope you find that useful.

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# posted by Richard Binning : Thursday, January 03, 2008 0 comments links to this post

Tuesday, December 18, 2007

Revit Uses Relative Links on Network

Did you know that by default Revit uses relative links when importing other files? While this may or may not be news to you, it does require you to think when moving or copying files to new destinations on your network.



Lesson: Don't assume that Revit will remember the full path and filename of linked files.





Sidenote: This opens up possibilities for remapping drive letters, using dos subst commands etc.

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# posted by Richard Binning : Tuesday, December 18, 2007 0 comments links to this post